


An Ode to the Boy who Lives Among the Stars

by hannahsapiens



Category: Naruto
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Brotherly Love, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-21
Updated: 2019-01-21
Packaged: 2019-10-14 00:58:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,660
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17498627
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hannahsapiens/pseuds/hannahsapiens
Summary: Contrary to popular belief, Sasuke never held a grudge against Itachi.





	An Ode to the Boy who Lives Among the Stars

**Author's Note:**

> No one proofread this and I've just been itching to post it already. English isn't my first language and further revisions will be made once mistakes get pointed out. Constructive criticism is valid.

Contrary to popular belief, Sasuke never held a grudge against Itachi. Sasuke was brilliant. He was a prodigy too, not just Itachi. Sasuke understood what his brother did.

But understanding has always been different from accepting, and though he understands why his brother did what he did, he doesn’t know if he’ll ever accept why.

Back when his clan was alive, Sasuke would be treated to stories about the Sharingan. How the user gains immense power through first activation alone and how, with enough training, the user can unlock the most powerful stage: the Mangekyo. Of course, nobody told Sasuke exactly what training meant. Nobody told Sasuke the true price, and he guesses he was glad that nobody did. He never understood his clan’s affinity for pain and suffering.

Who wants to live like that?

Another thing people forgot to tell him was that the Sharingan allows its user to remember things to a photographic extent. Sasuke’s Sharingan had unfortunately activated the night his clan had died. He doesn’t need to go into detail about what happened that night. Even without the Sharingan, Sasuke doesn’t think he’d ever forget how his brother looked when he saw his little brother’s prized family jutsu activate. He likes to think that he saw a hint of pain flash in his eyes. But that could just be him projecting.

Itachi orders him to hate him. And he doesn’t understand. He doesn’t think he wants to understand. But what can he do except follow his beloved brother’s order?

Itachi’s tears were the last thing he remembers before everything goes black.

 

————

 

For the first three days after the massacre, Sasuke thought his brother was on a mission. Nobody knew if it was denial or simply trauma, but Sasuke had walked up to the Hokage office and asked boldly when Itachi would be back.

Nobody would answer, of course. After all, who would want to ruin the boy even more? His family’s dead, and he thinks his brother’s on a mission.

Poor boy, they’d whisper.

It takes Sasuke five more days to accept, finally, that his clan is dead. It takes him five days to accept that the little kids from the block are long gone, and the pregnant woman from two houses down— Uchiha Riyo, he remembers— will never even have the chance to give birth. It takes him five days before remembers his parents are rotting underneath the Uchiha graveyard.

Three days after he accepts, he cries. He cries and sleeps outside his house and wonders if he could maybe scrub hard enough then the house would be clean again, and he’d stop smelling blood everywhere he turns.

A full month after the massacre, Sasuke takes a kunai to his chest and holds it there and wonders _‘if I press hard enough would Itachi come back?’_ But then again, he’s always been a coward. He lasts for a full two minutes before he remembers the blood rushing out his parents’ body and thinks _‘I can’t do this.’_ And he was only a kid. What does a kid know about death? What should a kid know about death?

 

————

 

Attending the Academy was quite possibly the dumbest thing Sasuke had done after the massacre.

He needed to get stronger, he knew that. And education had always been important to his family. But then, the Academy would’ve understood if he took a break, or if he outright refused to go back. He politely answered his teachers, told them it would take his mind off things. Maybe he’d even get a nice genin team, hr saids with a small smile. It wasn’t a convincing smile, at least not to Sasuke, but it was still enough to convince the Academy to allow him back.

 

———

 

Naruto is an idiot, and Sakura needs to leave him alone.

He’d hoped that he’d get partnered up with the smart boy from the Nara clan, or maybe even the Hyūga prodigy. Neji he at least knows, because he used to see him a lot when they were young.

Instead he gets saddled up with quite possibly two of his most annoying classmates, and he thinks ‘was my clan dying not enough?’ He dispels the thought immediately, finding it way too morbid to indulge in.

  
Still, he knows he can’t do anything. The teams have been assigned, and they already have a Sensei, so whining wouldn’t do him any good. Besides, an Uchiha never whines. An Uchiha would suck it up and use a situation to his advantage.

  
Eventually though, he warms up to them. He finds that as dumb Naruto can be sometimes he was also fiercely loyal. Naruto was also blessedly distracting, and his constant babbling would often bring Sasuke out of his brooding. He finds Sakura, who as long moved on from her attraction to him, was excellent at debates, and is almost always the instigator of fights among their team.

What he likes about them the most though was their ability to draw pity stares away from him. Naruto and Sakura would share one look, and then they’d start whatever ruckus they could think of, just so the eyes would stop staring at Sasuke.

  
Sasuke would never tell them, but he was grateful.

 

\--------

 

  
Before he knows it, Team 7 has carved a very special place into his heart. He finds himself thinking of Naruto’s smile, of Sakura’s kind words, and of Kakashi’s funny remarks.

  
Sometimes he wonders if they can hear his thoughts. He often avoids looking at them directly, because he fears that they’d be privy to his worst thoughts. He wonders if they know he’s thinking about his family all the time.

 

  
\-----

 

  
Sasuke first begins to develop a cough five months after his first mission with Team 7.

  
He pays it no mind, attributing it to the fact that his team spent an entire week sleeping outside, exposed to the harsh elements. Of course he’d get sick. In fact, he distinctly remembers Naruto acquiring a fever.

  
However, much to Sasuke’s surprise, his coughing doesn’t stop. He was in the middle of preparing dinner, thirteen days after the mission, when his body is wracked with a violent coughing fit. His vision blurs for a while, and he feels something wet splashing into his hands. When his vision cleared, he looked down and laughed.

  
There was blood on his hands.

 

\-------

  
It was fairly easy to keep his condition a secret from his teammates. Naruto was too blind to notice, and Sakura knew better than to pry. Kakashi takes one look at him and understands that he doesn’t want to talk about anything, so he doesn’t make any comments.

  
Sasuke tries to convince himself that the coughing fit was just an unusually rare form of cough. Eventually, he prays, it would go away. But then weeks pass, then weeks turn into months and before he knows it he’s taking money from the box underneath his bed to buy painkillers at the hospital. When the friendly nurse, Akane, asks him if he’s okay he just shrugs and says it’s for after mission pains.

 

\-----

 

  
His teammates find out, eventually. He knew it was only a matter of time before Naruto noticed that he’s been withdrawing on himself again. Besides, they’d have to find out sooner or later, because Sakura caught him in the hospital thrice already, buying painkillers that are way too strong for someone his age. They didn’t comment, of course. They knew better than to meddle.

  
The situation reaches his peak when they were given their third mission outside Konoha borders. To be fair, Sasuke should’ve known better than to come. He had woken up that morning with enough blood on his pillow to send him into a full blown panic attack. But he knew he would only make things worse for Naruto and Sakura, so he sucked it up and dressed up for the day.

  
Later that day, when Sasuke is barely breathing and Kakashi is screaming at him to wake up, he takes one last look at his team and accepts the darkness washing over him.

 

  
\----

 

  
When he wakes up to a bright light Sasuke thinks, _‘shit, am I dead?’_

  
For a second he does believe that he’s dead, until he feels a warm hand holding his own. He looks around, and with tired eyes he realizes he’s in a hospital room, and he sees that the warm hand holding his belongs to Naruto.

  
He smiles a little, the first smile he’s cracked in a long time.

  
“Dobe,” he whispers.

  
Naruto groans a little, but he doesn’t wake up.

  
“Dobe,” he tries again. “Wake up. I’m thirsty.” He places his cold hand—the one Naruto isn’t holding---against Naruto’s exposed cheek. This action startles Naruto awake, and he glares at Sasuke before Sasuke repeats his request.

  
Naruto hands over the glass of water, and Sasuke marvels at the fact that his lungs are clear enough to appreciate the cold flow of the water down his throat. They sit quietly. Naruto doesn’t speak, and Sasuke is thankful.

 

  
\---

 

  
“Ma, Sasuke, you gave us quite a scare back there.” Kakashi says after he enters his room.

  
Sakura hums in agreement beside Kakashi. “You stopped breathing for a second there. It’s a good thing I’ve picked up on a few healing lessons from Lady Tsunade. Otherwise you’d have been toast.”

  
Sasuke doesn’t reply, and instead opts to look outside. Besides, Kakashi and Sakura don’t seem to mind his silence. Either they think he’s still too sick to reply or he’s too scared to tell them what’s wrong. Whatever the reason was, he was thankful for their silence.

 

  
\----

 

  
Because Sasuke had no living relatives left in the village, his medical information was passed on to the closest he has to a parental figure right now: Kakashi.

  
He pretends to ignore Kakashi’s hard gaze as the doctor tells him what he’s been trying to ignore for months now: he’s sick. He’s incredibly and ridiculously sick.

  
The doctor discharges him with the promise of coming back for a follow-up checkup and an update of his medication. Kakashi makes the promise for him, and together they make the silent trek towards the Uchiha compound.

  
If Kakashi stays the night outside the house to listen if Sasuke gets another coughing fit then that’s for the night to know and for no one to find out.

 

  
\----

 

  
Kakashi corners him a mere week after he is released from the hospital.

  
“Have you gone to the hospital yet?” He asks.

  
Sasuke shrugs. “Why do you care?” He replies.

 

“I care about my team, Sasuke” Kakashi tells him, “even if I don’t look like I do.”

  
Sasuke takes a good look at Kakashi and wonders how he’d probably be leaving him soon, and all of a sudden he gets the desire to draw the man into a hug. He doesn’t. The same way he doesn’t tell him that he’s flushed down his medication four days ago. The same way he doesn’t tell him that he’s gotten worse.

  
Instead, to offer Kakashi a little comfort, he smiles and tells him, for the first time; “thank you.”

 

  
\---

 

  
Sometimes, when he feels extra lonely, Sasuke visits his cousin Mira’s garden. He remembers playing there in that vast garden. Walking there gives him peace of mind; makes him forget a lot of things.

  
After a particularly bad coughing fit earlier in the evening, Sasuke unsteadily left his house and walked towards his cousin’s garden. Faintly he hears rustling in the trees, and wonders if Kakashi was trailing him. He ignores the sound, but he walks faster.

  
When he arrives, Sasuke rests against a tree he recalls Mira used to climb in when they were younger. The branches were low, so Mira would be able to climb without having to think about how to get down. Sasuke never liked heights, so he’d stay down and carve things at the bottom of the tree. Ripping himself away from the memory, Sasuke traces the letters he carved on the tree. The bark feels rough against his skin, and he thinks about how that memory seems like a lifetime ago now. He doesn’t even remember how Mira looks like anymore.

  
A branch cracks behind him, and he abruptly stands up and draws his kunai, preparing to confront the attacker. It was apparently a wrong move, as he feels like he’s been smacked in the head as the world spins around him. He feels warm arms wrap around him, steadying him as a nasty cough wracks up his body. All of a sudden, tears fall from his eyes, because he can’t breathe, and the arms feel suspiciously familiar and it takes him back to days before his family died. To days where he’d excitedly run home and say—

  
“Itachi.” He whispers through his tears.

  
He never expected to see Itachi again, if he’s being honest. Betrayal does that to you, he thinks. But Sasuke’s never held a grudge. He’ll take what he can get.  
Another bad cough squeezes its way out of Sasuke’s lungs, and for a second he thinks ‘this is it, this is when I die.’

  
Itachi’s hand continues to run over his back. He whispers assurances into his ears, and waits until Sasuke’s lungs clear out a little before he speaks.

 

“Oh Sasuke,” he says. “What have they done to you.”

  
Sasuke smiles softly--- ‘weakly’ his mind supplies. “I think I’m sick, Itachi.”

  
Itachi chuckles sadly before he lifts Sasuke into his arms. “You think so?” he replies.

  
“I know so. I’ve been sick for a while now, Nii-san.” Sasuke tells him.

  
They walk in silence towards their old house, and with his eyes closed; Sasuke pretends for a minute that his brother is carrying him back after a day of training, and that when they arrive home his mother would be there to welcome them back with a warm smile. Of course, illusions have the trait of never lasting long, and when another cough forces its way out of his lungs he remembers exactly where and when he is.

  
When Itachi lays him down on his bed he finally admits out loud what he’s been wanting to say.

  
“Nii-san, I think I’m dying.”

  
He wonders why he’s so afraid now.

  
Perhaps to him, dying didn’t seem like an option. Not when he’s the last survivor of what was once a powerful clan. He had thought of rebuilding his clan. Maybe someday settling down and raising a family of his own. Creating a new future out of the bitter history he was given. All of that seemed impossible now, and admitting to Itachi what was coming was the last straw to complete his acceptance.

  
Itachi didn’t argue with his statement. Instead he opts to sit down beside his brother. Sasuke doesn’t miss Itachi’s shaking hands though. He doesn’t miss the way his breaths suddenly grew labored, as if every breath was heavier than the last.

  
“Go to sleep.” Itachi finally says.

  
Sasuke is afraid though. He’s afraid that if he even blinks for a moment too long then Itachi would leave and he’d be alone again. When Itachi makes a move to stand up, Sasuke grabs the hem of his cloak and looks at him with everything he can.

  
“Stay with me. Please.” He begs with tears in his voice. “I don’t know how long I have left, so if you loved me at all then please stay. You don’t have to deal with me any longer.”

  
Itachi’s breath hitches, and for a second Sasuke thinks he was laughing at him. But when he opens his eyes he finds his brother trying to hold back his tears.

  
“So will you stay this time? Please, Itachi?” He says for the last time. He waits until Itachi nods, and then he welcomes sleep.

 

  
\----

 

  
He woke up the next morning to someone holding a spoon to his mouth.

  
“Drink up,” the voice says.

  
Sasuke opens his mouth, and soon it’s filled with a bitter taste that he tries to spit out. A hand covers his mouth close.

  
“Don’t spit it out,” the voice—Itachi, your brother, his mind tells him—says. “It’ll help ease the pain.”

  
Sasuke forces his throat to accept the offending liquid before eagerly accepting the glass of water Itachi gives him. He starts feeling drowsy again, and no matter how much he reasons with himself that he just woke up, his body inevitably gives in to the need for sleep.

  
The days that follow were blurry to Sasuke. He would often wake up in violent fits, and most times he’d forget where he was and lash out. His memories were jumbled. Most nights Itachi hears him call out for their mother. Some night he calls for Itachi. Sometimes he says other names, a Naruto, a Sakura, and unexpectedly, he calls out Kakashi’s name. Sometimes, Sasuke would wake up both crying and coughing, and he begs Itachi not to leave again, as if forgetting how Itachi had agreed to stay days ago.

  
Those were the better days, if you could call them that.

  
There was one time where Sasuke woke up and he couldn’t even remember who he was. He had looked straight into Itachi’s eyes and asked if he knew who he was, and Itachi couldn’t even answer, because seeing Sasuke in pain had rendered him speechless long before the third day of violent coughing began.

 

  
\-----

 

  
There was one day where Sasuke actually got better. For the first time in a week in a half he had woken up without an accompanying cough. He had smiled at Itachi and sat with him for breakfast. They didn’t need to talk, but they did share a few smiles. They had even fought over who was getting the last piece of toast, and though Itachi put up a fight, he eventually relented and gave it to Sasuke.

  
Later that afternoon Itachi left to find more herbs for Sasuke’s medicine. Promising to come back, he had left Sasuke with a kiss to the forehead and a quick hug.

  
The exact moment his brother left was also the same moment someone started knocking on his door. He goes and opens it only to see his teammates and Kakashi on the other side.

  
“Sasuke! Teme, we haven’t seen you in over a week.” Naruto says as he moves to hug him. He starts rambling about how Sasuke’s missed a lot. He makes eye contact with Sakura, who merely shrugs and moves to go inside the house. He looks at Kakashi next, and he realizes that Kakashi must have told them about his illness already.

  
So Sasuke spends the entire afternoon talking and laughing with his team. He eats the ramen Naruto bought for him, and he wears the gloves Sakura knitted. He finally gets to touch Kakashi’s bells and all in all it had been fun. He hadn’t coughed once, and for a second he thought things were getting better.

  
Naruto yawned the same moment the sun started to set. Kakashi, taking the hint, had pulled Sakura and Naruto up in order to take them home. Sasuke takes them to the door.

  
“Sasuke, get better soon okay?” Sakura tells him while putting on her shoes. “You have to get better soon so that I don’t have to deal with Naruto all by myself.”

  
Sasuke smiles, and then promises that he will.

  
“We’ll see you soon, okay?” Naruto frowns. “I miss you. We miss you. We’ve been holding off on accepting missions until you get better. So you have to get better soon.” Naruto holds his hand out, and Sasuke shakes it.

Sasuke’s heart aches for his two closest friends. He wonders why he ever thought he could leave them behind.

  
Naruto and Sakura head out first, promising to wait for Kakashi at the compound gates. Kakashi looks at Sasuke. When Kakashi deems Sasuke fine and moves to finally leave, Sasuke does the unthinkable and pulls Kakashi into a tight hug. They stand there for a while, the setting sun their only background. He hears Naruto and Sakura running back and suddenly he’s surrounded by arms from different directions. They hug it out, and he thinks he even felt Kakashi’s hand ruffle his hair.

  
It was a great day.

  
In hindsight, that should’ve been the biggest warning.

 

  
\----

 

  
Itachi arrives at the house and sees Sasuke barely breathing and lying in a small pool of blood.

  
Quickly, he gathers his brother into his arms and takes him to the bath. Sasuke feels cold, but he needs to be cleaned. Itachi scrubs the blood away and puts him in new clothes. He lays him on the bed just as he starts coughing again.

  
“Nii-san,” Sasuke croaks, and Itachi’s heart hurts for his brother.

  
“It’s okay, Sasuke, Nii-san is here. I will help you, okay? Just hang on.” He tries to comfort him. Sasuke starts crying, and tells Itachi that he doesn’t want to die.

  
“I promised them, Itachi. Nii-san. I promised them. I said I was going back. I s—“ Sasuke starts coughing again, and this time the fit was so violent that Itachi thinks he can feel it in his bones.

  
For the first time in a long time Itachi bows his head and prays to whoever is listening to spare his brother the pain. To give his brother the cure, because if there’s anyone who doesn’t deserve this then it was Sasuke. Sasuke, who has never done anything wrong. Sasuke, who has done nothing but exist and should continue to do so.

  
_‘Give me his illness. Please, just don’t let him suffer anymore.’_ Itachi prays.

  
Sasuke continues to cough, and Itachi thinks that maybe nobody will listen to him anymore.

 

  
\----

 

  
Sasuke stopped coughing a little after midnight.

  
By then, he was already very weak. He could barely keep his eyes open. All his joints are aching, and he feels highly disoriented. His vision is blurry, and he can’t seem to move anything at all.

  
Still, he turns to his side to look at Itachi.

  
“Are you alright?” His brother asks.

  
He nods, and then whispers. “Let’s go outside, Nii-san.”

  
And Itachi, ever the older brother who spoils his little brother, carries him outside.

  
“Where to, Sasuke?” He says with a tight voice.

  
“Mira’s.” He says. “Let’s go to Mira’s.”

  
The walk towards the vast garden of Uchiha Mira’s family felt like a death sentence to Itachi. Sasuke shivers and Itachi doesn’t know if it’s from the cold or from the illness taking over his body. When they finally reach the garden, Sasuke asks to be set down beside the tree Mira used to climb in. He pats the space beside him.

  
“Sit here, Nii-san.” He whispers.

  
Itachi sits, and for a while they just look up the stars.

  
“I never understood you, Nii-san.” Sasuke says in a weak voice. “I was close to you, but not once did I understand you. I wonder why.”

  
Itachi holds his hand and brings it to his lap. “Maybe you just need to stay long enough to figure me out.” He pleads.

  
Sasuke laughs. “Yeah, I should do that.”

  
They fall into silence once more, and Sasuke’s breathing gradually slows down. And Itachi prays one last time.

  
“Nii-san?"

 

“Yes, Sasuke?”

  
“The skies are very clear tonight aren’t they?”

  
Itachi looks at Sasuke and sees that Sasuke’s eyes are closed.

  
“They are, Sasuke. Do you want to take a closer look?”

  
Sasuke hums, and Itachi lifts him up and scales the tree in three quick jumps.

  
They settle in a branch, and Itachi pulls Sasuke closer to him.

  
“You know,” Sasuke starts, “this is the first time I’ve ever climbed a tree. Thank you, Nii-san.”

  
Itachi kisses his forehead.

  
“Nii-san?”

  
“Yes, Sasuke?”

  
“Do you love me?” Sasuke finally asks before taking a deep breath.

  
The tears that Itachi’s been trying to keep at bay finally fall down and suddenly he’s mad. He’s mad at the world for forcing them to be in this situation. He’s mad at whatever force is trying to take Sasuke away from him because ‘it wasn’t supposed to go this way, damn it all.’ Sasuke was supposed to live. He was supposed to get his revenge, move on, and build a family. Not this. He shouldn’t be here. He shouldn’t be 13 and dying in the arms of his brother. He’s angry, and he couldn’t say anything except—

  
“There’s no one I love more than you, Sasuke.”

  
Sasuke smiles. He opens his eyes and looks up at Itachi and for a second, Itachi remembers how Sasuke first looked at him, a few days after he was born.

  
_“Don’t worry Sasuke; your big brother is here to protect you, no matter what.”_

  
“I want to go see the stars now, Nii-san.” Sasuke closes his eyes.

  
Itachi counts. One. Two. Three. Itachi’s heart starts beating faster, and he thinks that if he wills his heart to beat even faster then maybe it would beat enough for both of them. Enough for Sasuke. Enough to keep him alive for just a few moments more.

  
Sasuke doesn’t open his eyes again.

 

 

  
\-----

 

  
Sasuke was buried in a plot far from his other family members. Itachi thought about it for a while, but he decided Sasuke wouldn’t want to be there, in a crowded grave. Instead, he dug a hole underneath the shade of the tree he died on. Itachi had sat for a while, after laying his brother to rest for the last time. He’d thought about what to put for Sasuke’s headstone. Eventually, he settled on something.

  
_Uchiha, Sasuke_

  
_To the boy who among the stars will never feel pain again._

  
It seemed fitting, Itachi thought. There was nothing else Sasuke wanted more than to be with the stars.

  
Unsurprisingly, Itachi wasn’t the only presence in the area. After a while, Kakashi makes himself known, and if his eyes are red Itachi doesn’t make a comment.

  
“What will you do now?” Kakashi asks him.

  
What an odd question, Itachi thinks. What now, really. What now when the one thing he’d live for was gone.

  
Itachi shrugs and he touches the lone flower in Sasuke’s grave.

  
“I’ll tell Naruto and Sakura in the morning.” Kakashi says then leaves, but not before he places another flower beside the one already in Sasuke’s grave.

 

Itachi sits beside Sasuke’s grave and thinks about staying there until he can face a world where his little brother doesn’t exist.

 

He stays for quite a long time.

 

On the fifth morning after Sasuke was buried Itachi finally walks away, and he doesn’t look back. He doesn’t know if he can.

  
By nightfall, there were four fresh flowers on top of the young Uchiha’s grave. Four flowers from four people he left too soon.

 

  
—-

 

  
In the end, Itachi abandons his previous plans. He leaves the Akatsuki, and he doesn’t look back when they ask why. He doesn’t return to Konoha, no. Not when the wound is still too fresh.

  
Instead he travels the world. He goes through village after village and helps out if he could. He learns things. He works. At the end of the day he would look up to the sky and imagine that Sasuke is sitting right beside him looking too. He doesn’t consider dying. As the last Uchiha left he owes it to his family, especially to Sasuke, to live on and continue their legacy. Besides, Itachi doesn’t think he deserves to die yet, not when he has so much to atone for.

 

  
_

 

  
Itachi comes back to Sasuke’s grave exactly a year after he died.

  
Nothing much has changed, but it’s painfully obvious that his grave is well maintained. He notices the flowers planted around it, and he silently thanks Naruto, Sakura, and Kakashi for being there when he couldn’t.

  
He sits down, placing a single tomato beside Sasuke’s grave.

  
“You’ll never guess what happened the other day, Sasuke…”

  
And if Itachi feels the wind wrap around him, he doesn’t seem to mind.

**Author's Note:**

> sorry. scream at me on twitter: @iidakimasu


End file.
